Here's some industry news for you: the UK's Competition and Markets Authority has announced today they've blocked Microsoft's takeover of Activision.
Interestingly, the main concern of the UK CMA here seems to be around Cloud Gaming specifically. As they said in their statement "Microsoft has a strong position in cloud gaming services and the evidence available to the CMA showed that Microsoft would find it commercially beneficial to make Activision’s games exclusive to its own cloud gaming service." and that "The deal would reinforce Microsoft’s advantage in the market by giving it control over important gaming content such as Call of Duty, Overwatch, and World of Warcraft. The evidence available to the CMA indicates that, absent the merger, Activision would start providing games via cloud platforms in the foreseeable future.".
Quite a big blow to the $68.7 billion deal!
We saw Microsoft attempt to get around these concerns, with various Cloud Gaming deals being announced over the last year but it seems that just hasn't been enough. An interesting part of the CMA announcement was on a proposal submitted by Microsoft, to address some of their concerns, this proposal was to set out "requirements governing what games must be offered by Microsoft to what platforms and on what conditions over a ten-year period" but one of the shortcomings noted was "It was not sufficiently open to providers who might wish to offer versions of games on PC operating systems other than Windows.". Nice to see.
The UK certainly isn't the only country to be concerned by the power this deal would hand to Microsoft with the US FTC also trying to block it and according to Reuters earlier this year there were no substantive settlement talks on it. So now with the UK blocking it, that will likely boost the FTC's argument to block it too. On top of that, there's also the EU regulators decision coming up next month.
Microsoft, naturally, will be attempting to appeal the decision.
What are your thoughts?
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Esp with Microsoft, I think it's apparent they're in the Good Guy state right now for positive press and getting gamers to side with them, until they have enough big name game studios to pull everything back into their walled garden Windows store/cloud services and lock out other systems.
If we don't need one thing, then it is a gaming-monoply in microsoft hands...even more so than it wouldn't be a good thing wiht any other comapny to have such an influence.
Esp with Microsoft, I think it's apparent they're in the Good Guy state right now for positive press and getting gamers to side with them,
And i'm shocked how many people fall for that and praise MS and the game pass...i hate the term 'sheeple', but it rarely fits better...
Last edited by Termy on 26 April 2023 at 11:43 am UTC
And i'm shocked how many people fall for that and praise MS and the game pass...i hate the term 'sheeple', but it rarely fits better...
Just going through comments esp on Reddit, it's amazing how many people are completely convinced that if the deal goes through, Acti would be cleaned out, all the favorite old IPs revived and all games given top love and attention, and totally have WoW and Diablo on gamepass/Steam.
Basically, so many people seem to have this weird dreaming mindset of, Acti sucks, so if they get bought out, the megacorp will magically do everything I'd like and nothing bad!. Not that I like Acti or its current state, but I've never seen people fight so hard for consolidation as this.
And i'm shocked how many people fall for that and praise MS and the game pass...i hate the term 'sheeple', but it rarely fits better...
Just going through comments esp on Reddit, it's amazing how many people are completely convinced that if the deal goes through, Acti would be cleaned out, all the favorite old IPs revived and all games given top love and attention, and totally have WoW and Diablo on gamepass/Steam.
Basically, so many people seem to have this weird dreaming mindset of, Acti sucks, so if they get bought out, the megacorp will magically do everything I'd like and nothing bad!. Not that I like Acti or its current state, but I've never seen people fight so hard for consolidation as this.
i dont think microsoft cant be worst that Activision, at least there would be hope on games like World of Warcraft, that Activision keeps destroying, i wanted to some Hope for Blizzard Games.
ssj17vegeta Apr 26, 2023
A shame Reagan damaged antitrust laws so much in the 80s.
StalePopcorn Apr 26, 2023
i dont think microsoft cant be worst that Activision
Activision doesn't have it's own quasi-monopoly on the desktop that it could abuse to cripple competitors though ;)
The last thing we need is getting a huge walled forest and locking every game behind the M$ Store and Xbox console.....
Thank Lord Gaben for emulation....... It might be all I play in the future if this is going to be the future........
That surely must be referring to Linux and macOS, as there aren't exactly many other PC OSes that are relevant in terms of marketshare.
- It was not sufficiently open to providers who might wish to offer versions of games on PC operating systems other than Windows.
IDK, there are so many abandonware titles related with Activision due to licensing issues, I would prefer Activision to be absorbed by Microsoft which might lessen the issue a bit.
Damn, there goes my hope for The Lost Vikings 3.
This particular shortcoming listed by the CMA is rather interesting:Wow, this really does demonstrate a big improvement over their past dealings with the games industry!
That surely must be referring to Linux and macOS, as there aren't exactly many other PC OSes that are relevant in terms of marketshare.
- It was not sufficiently open to providers who might wish to offer versions of games on PC operating systems other than Windows.
Microsoft should be allowed to buy activision if not when sony should stop buying gaming studios and making exclusive deals behind closed doors. So fuck them both
I mean I agree with what to do with them both, but just because Sony has gotten away with things doesn't mean MS gets a free pass.
And the people opposed to this deal are not even into cloud gaming, all their other arguments failed, it's not even a popular choice for gamers, but yet they made a ruling on something that is not very marketable or harmful to anyone. This is plain simple grasping at straws.
That's the future, 2012 game still costing $60.00, Activision is a dying company, maybe microsoft should just target Blizzard and try make a FPS thats better than COD.
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